B Cell Epitopes Prediction Service

Antigenic epitopes are regions of the antigen surface that are preferentially recognized by antibodies. Prediction of B cell antigenic epitopes is of direct help to the design of vaccine components and immuno-diagnostic reagents. Creative Biolabs has focused on the development of computational protein design services for many years and has established excellent protein engineering platforms for drug development. We provide a variety of B cell epitopes prediction services to meet the diverse needs of our customers.

Introduction to B Cell Epitopes Prediction

B cell epitopes can be divided into two main groups: linear and conformational. Linear B cell epitopes consist of sequential residues, peptides, whereas conformational B cell epitopes consist of patches of solvent-exposed atoms from residues that are not necessarily sequential. The most reliable methods for identification of a B cell epitope are X-ray crystallography and NMR techniques, but they are time-consuming and expensive. Hence, computational methods and tools, with the virtues of low cost and high speed, were employed to predict B cell epitopes in silico. In general, two approaches are employed to predict epitopes: sequence-based methods, structure-based methods.

Sequence-based Methods

Sequence-based methods are limited to the prediction of linear epitopes. The majority of the sequence-based methods assume that epitopes have to be accessible for antibody binding and are based on simple amino acid propensity scales, such as hydrophilicity, hydrophobicity, solvent accessibility, secondary structure, flexibility, and many others.

Structure-based Methods

The structure-based prediction model bases on 3D protein structure to screen potential binders. Structural similarity between the query protein and template proteins are used to predict epitopes of interest. Existing structure-based epitope identifying techniques include mutagenesis, competition experiments, free energy scoring function, knowledge-based free energy scoring, protein threading, homology modeling, virtual pockets, rigid/flexible docking, and atomistic molecular dynamics simulations.

Fig.1 Linear and conformational B cell epitopes.

Services

The identification of B cell epitopes is rather important to immunodetection and immunotherapeutic applications since an epitope as the minimal immune unit is strong enough to elicit a potent humoral immune response with no harmful side effects to the human body. For linear B cell epitopes, we can provide five scale-based methods for prediction. For conformational B cell epitopes, six different prediction methods based on three-dimensional structures of antigens and implemented as web servers are provided, including the only two existing methods developed specifically for epitope prediction, CEP and DiscoTope; two protein-protein docking methods, DOT and PatchDock; and two structure-based methods for protein-protein binding site prediction, PPI-PRED and ProMate.

Creative Biolabs has been involved in the field of computational protein design for many years and we are committed to completing your project with high quality. We have accumulated a wealth of scientific experience from our completed projects and provide you with the best services to ensure your requirements are met. If you are interested in our services, please contact us for more details.

All listed services and products are For Research Use Only. Do Not use in any diagnostic or therapeutic applications.

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